Stacy Keach, the prolific actor who starred on TV’s Mike Hammer and Titus and recurred on Blue Bloods after establishing himself as a stage and film actor, died Monday. He was 85.
His wife, Małgosia Tomassi, said he died “after a long and difficult battle with a serious heart condition and heart failure” at the family home in Magdalenka, Poland.
“Stacy was not only a legendary actor, admired and loved by audiences the world over, but also my beloved husband, my companion and the heart of our family,” she wrote. “His passing leaves an immeasurable emptiness in our lives. But his extraordinary spirit, his unforgettable voice and the love he gave so generously will remain with us forever.”
Keach appeared in several Broadway, Off Broadway and local shows during the 1960s, often in Shakespeare plays, and earned a Best Actor Tony nomination and Drama Desk Award for playing Buffalo Bill in the 1970 play Indians. He would be inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame in 2015.
He began landing film roles late in that decade. He starred as an aging, alcoholic boxer who works with a younger fighter (Jeff Bridges) in John Huston’s Fat City (1972) and played famed gunfighter Doc Holliday opposite Faye Dunaway in Doc (1971) and starred with George C. Scott in cop drama The New Centurians (1971).
Other early film credits include The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972) with titular star Paul Newman; starring as Martin Luther in Luther (1974) and playing aviation pioneer Wilbur Wright in Orville and Wilbur (1972).
Keach also began working in television during the 1960s, playing Banquo in a 1968 production of Macbeth and other telefilms. He also played Napoleon Bonaparte in The Man of Destiny (1973). His first series-regular role was starring as a police lieutenant in the one-season ABC drama Caribe in 1975.
Keach would continue appearing regularly on TV and in features throughout the 1970s, including narrating Ridley Scott’s directing debut The Duellists (1977). He had a memorable key supporting role as Sgt. Stedanko in Cheech and Chong’s film debut Up in Smoke (1978), in which his tough-guy persona gives way to broad stoner humor. He reprised the role in the duo’s 1981 pic Nice Dreams, in which Stedanko’s increasing pot intake turns him into a lizard. Keach also starred opposite Charlton Heston, Ned Beatty and David Carradine in the 1978 submarine-disaster pic Gray Lady Down.
As the 1980s dawned, he starred with David, Keith and Robert Carradine in Walter Hill’s western The Long Riders, which premiered at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival. Keach also earned his lone career writing credit only big-screen exec producer gig on the movie.
What probably is his most recognizable role came mid-decade, when he was cast as the famous literary private detective in the CBS series Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer, which debuted in midseason 1984 and would air for three seasons into 1987. His wisecracking private eye often shared the screen with scantily-clad bombshells, NYPD cops, street folks and contacts, including know-it-all Ozzie the Answer (Danny Goldman). Hammer always solved the case.
Filming on the show was interrupted when Keach was busted with cocaine at London’s Heathrow Airport. He was sentenced to nine months in prison after pleading guilty. The actor served six months and would return to the iconic role in the retitled The New Mike Hammer. The series never was a big hit, failing to make the year-end primetime Top 30 in the three-network universe, but it had many ardent fans.
It was followed by a 1989 telefilm, Mike Hammer: Murder Takes All, and Keach would reprise the role for the syndicated Mike Hammer: Private Eye, which aired for two seasons in 1997-98.
All along, Keach continued to land film and TV roles, including the popular 1982 miniseries The Blue and the Gray and playing the legendary writer in the 1988 miniseries Hemingway. In 1996, he played Commander Mac Malloy, the ruthless commander of Firebase 7 who convinced Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell) to take on another dirty job in Escape From L.A. Two years later, he landed the role of the white supremacist mentor to Edward Norton’s character in American History X.
He also hosted more than 150 episodes of The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas from 2002-12.
Born on June 2, 1941, in Savannah, Georgia, Keach began has acting career on the stage and would return to the Bard’s work often, notably playing Falstaff in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, the lead in King Lear and the Danish prince in Hamlet. Keach also would take on such classic roles onstage as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman, Richard Nixon in Frost/Nixon and Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol.
He stayed busy as an actor in the 21st century, notably leading Fox’s 2000-02 dark comedy Titus, co-starring as lead Matt LeBlanc’s father in dozens of episodes of CBS’ Man with a Plan and recurring on NBC’s The Blacklist from 2019-23. Many younger fans likely knowing his work as Archbishop/Cardinal Kevin Kearns, a friend of Frank Reagan (Tom Selleck), in about a dozen episodes of CBS’ Blue Bloods from 2016 until the final season in 2024.
He is survived by Tomassi; his children, Karolina and Shannon Keach; his grandchildren and their spouses.
